Chapter 3

Staring in pure shock, Abbott took one step into the room, lantern held aloft. The flickering light cast dancing shadows onto the damp walls, surrounding him with his own figure. Circling around, closing in- like the woman from his vision.

He tried to clear his mind and stepped gingerly farther into the room, lifting his light to view every corner. Besides the bed and work table, the room was completely empty.

Abbott scratched his head. This didn’t make sense. Where was the man going when he disappeared into his room for hours on end? Abbott knew that he was working on the youth potion, but there weren’t even any ingredients on the table for him to work with. He was completely and utterly puzzled. Besides that, where even was O’Leary? Abbott had almost never known him to leave in the years that he could remember living in the Empyrium. He was a secretive man for sure, and kept to himself outside of store hours, but he was always skulking around the building somewhere. In fact, Abbott thought, the previous night had been the first time Alastair had ever left- to Abbott’s knowledge.

He approached the bed in the corner, eyeing the rumpled sheets covering it. It surely seemed as if someone had jumped out of it in a hurry, not even bothering to straighten the covers. He lifted one sheet cautiously, looking under it as if perhaps the man would be hiding. Instead, he exposed an unnatural looking object- the corner of a sheet of parchment, tucked under the pillow purposefully. Abbott looked back at the door, which had seemingly shut on its own, and reached over to grab the paper. It slid out from beneath the pillow with a crisp swish as he brought it up to his face. His bruised eyes struggling in the dim light, he set the lantern on the edge of the bed and held the paper back. It was a note, scrawled in O’Leary’s handwriting that covered the displays around the store. Abbott recognized this immediately, however, the normally immaculate print had shifted into something more like cursive. It was obvious that the man had been writing fast- but why?

Abbott strained his eyes to see the top. He had never been a great reader, as he hadn’t gotten any sort of an education, but years of reorganizing shelves in the store left him with a basic reading vocabulary. It was enough to make out that the letter was addressed… to him?

Dearest Abbott, it read. Do pardon me for leaving on such short notice, but I needed time to… compose myself after the events of last night. If you believe that you can do my job and talk to customers despite what I’ve always told you, you won’t have any trouble running the shoppe in my absence. I will be back soon, but fair warning- I have eyes everywhere. You know this. If you even think of running, I will come. I will find you. And I will make you wish that last night was the biggest of your problems.

Your gracious Master,

Alastair O’Leary.

Abbott shivered, even though it was plenty warm in the room. It felt as though someone was slowly running a frozen finger down his spine. The threats in that letter were not even close to masked by the level of false sweetness that resonated throughout the words, and it was taking all Abbott had not to fling the letter down on the floor and leave. Even though Alastair certainly had ways of punishing him for his disobedience, whether physical or magical, Abbott almost felt that it wasn’t worth it. If he could just get out, get away-

He scolded himself for even thinking about it. Even if he could get away, he knew nothing about how to survive out in the real world. There were certainly many downsides to being raised in a magic shoppe with an abusive guardian, and that was one of them. He wouldn’t last a minute on the streets, O’Leary often told him. He needed to be thankful for the home that he had so graciously received from Alastair, because at any moment he could decide to kick Abbott out, and as he liked to remind Abbott, there were plenty of more dangerous people in the world that would take advantage of a naive kid like him. He’d be dead before he could even blink, all his worldly possessions (which wasn’t much) stolen and spread out more than his body parts would be. It was a cruel world, and Alastair was really doing him a favor by preparing him for whatever may come. If he could ever get out, that was.

He crumpled the paper, shoving it into his pocket. He was just going to have to deal with whatever Alastair had in store for him, probably for the rest of his life. But if it was truly better than the outside world, perhaps he shouldn’t be complaining. Maybe he should instead be thanking the man, down on his knees, begging for forgiveness, groveling at his feet, praying to the god that O’Leary clearly thought he was. The old man would certainly like that, but just the mere thought of it made Abbott want to vomit- again.

Just thinking about being sick brought all the pain that he had temporarily forgotten about back. He could barely make his way back to his room before collapsing on the bed and finally- finally! getting some much-needed sleep. For once, his dreams weren’t filled with nonsense, though. The robed woman lurked in the corner of his vision all night, whispering in a language Abbott both could and couldn’t understand. He knew that she was calling him to her again, but as his unconscious body thrashed in the covers, he couldn’t wake up. Couldn’t escape.

His eyes jerked open as the woman exploded into a shower of green sparks, filling his vision. Sweat beaded on his clammy forehead, and nausea prompted him to practically vault out of his bed and into the bathroom in the hall. He leaned over the toilet for minutes on end, what was left of his pathetic meals splashing into the toilet. He wiped his mouth with a shaky hand, thinking that this was becoming an all-too-familiar scene. He was just contemplating drinking any and all of the bottles in the shoppe at once when he heard a muffled voice from outside of the door, down the hall.

“I think the man’s gone. That’s what that scrawny brat said to me this morning. The time is perfect.”

Abbott’s head shot up in alarm. There were people in the shoppe, in the middle of the night. It sounded like they were trying to… rob him? And to make matters worse, the voice sounded like it belonged to that woman who had attacked him in the store over a poultice. Was she back for revenge?

Abbott slipped into his room and grabbed the dagger he kept under his pillow. He held it close to his face, his breath leaving clouds of fear on the blade. He could see his own reflection in what little light was seeping into the room; his eyes had dark rings circling them from exhaustion and bruises, and his cheekbones jutted out far from his face like rocky outcroppings on a mountain. He hadn’t eaten a square meal in months, and he certainly looked the part. He just hoped his appearance would be enough to scare away whatever threat was about to come his way.

On silent feet, nimble from years of practice, he swept down the hall, his back against the wall. He could hear the voices again, clearly now. Two of them, and if Abbott wasn’t mistaken, they belonged to the same two customers who had given him hell that morning. Just what he needed- a pair of maniacs out for revenge.

“I don’t know where the boy came from,” the man spoke in a low voice. “I’ve never seen him around before, and O’Leary’s never mentioned anything about an apprentice. Not to mention the fact that he looked like a corpse risen from the grave. D’ya think he offed O’Leary and is out to make money?”

“It’s possible,” the woman returned. “But whatever is going on here, it’s not right. Stupid kid didn’t even know how to run the shop, let alone lock the damn door. It’s no wonder he’s resorted to criminality. He’s too thick to do anything else.”

Shit! He had forgotten to lock the door to the goddamn shoppe. Now he was going to have to deal with two angry customers who thought he had murdered Alastair. If they knew the truth, that he was basically held hostage by the man, would they be more sympathetic? Would they even believe him? Probably not. He hoped he wouldn’t have to fight his way out of this one. He had only ever learned to defend himself, and not physically. Alastair had taken it upon himself to try to teach the boy magic when he was younger, assuming he would have some affinity with it due to his prophetic abilities, but Abbott had never quite gotten the hang of it. He hadn’t even thought about practicing in years- that was before Alastair had started drinking much more and, as a result, treating Abbott poorly. Before, he was tolerable, sometimes even pleasant, but now? Abbott wouldn’t even feel a tinge of remorse if he had murdered the old man.

The male voice spoke again. “Well, if the boy’s in here, he’s not going to be for much longer. Can you imagine the reward we could get from the prison if we caught a murderer? We won’t have to suffer again. We could get your son a doctor, and I- I could have all the guns I wanted. I could buy a gun for all of my children!”

The woman scoffed. “They’d just kill each other, imbecile. Then you’d be tried for murder.”

There was a loud noise, like a hand slapping against a face, and the man huffed in a rage. “Don’t you dare ever call me an imbecile, or they might just find your dead body next.”

Abbott couldn’t breathe. He was dealing with people from the real world, who wanted to turn him in for a reward, and certainly sounded as though they could be murderers themselves. If they ever stopped arguing, they would certainly come and catch him. He couldn’t take on two people at once, not when they sounded like they could kill him in his sleep. God knew that he couldn’t hurt other people, he didn’t have the stomach nor the heart for it. But there was no way out; the only exit was from the front doors to the store, where the two thugs were waiting for him. Unless…

How did O’Leary leave? He hadn’t left through the front, or Abbott would have heard him. There were no windows he could climb through in the rest of the building, and no other doors. That left only one reasonable explanation: perhaps there was a secret exit of sorts in his bedroom. That would explain why there was nothing in the room itself; all of his stuff could be hidden in a secret room. Maybe it had a way out!

Abbott slid down the hall in bare feet and practically dove into the room at the end of the hall, closing the door behind him as quietly as he could. He surveyed the room, using the lantern that he had lit earlier, which was sitting on the workbench still, the flame on its last legs. There didn’t appear to be any secret doors in the walls, and the bathroom appeared to be just that- a bathroom. Which left the workbench, and… the bed.

Maybe there was a reason Alastair had left the covers in such a mess, hanging off the bed and draping onto the floor around it. Could it be- hiding something?

Abbott gathered all the sheets into his arms and cast them aside. As they collapsed in a pile in the corner with nothing but a whisper, Abbott frantically felt around with his hands in the dark. His fingers were scrabbling on the ground for anything that felt different, his nails digging into the wooden floor of the bed, searching for something, anything-

A lip! His fingers caught the edge of a board sticking apart from the others. Grabbing the lantern in his other hand, he pulled himself farther under the bed by his fingertips, exploring the floor. There was certainly something there, but was it a trapdoor? His hand grazed against a dip on the edge, something his fingers could hook themselves into and pull.

The floor gave way, an entire section of the ground flipping up without even a sound. The trapdoor was heavy, and Abbott was wedged underneath the cot in an uncomfortable manner, but there was enough room for him to manoeuver his legs into the hole it left behind. It was dark, too obscure to see into the passage, and so he held his breath and slid his body all the way into the drop.

His feet touched something warm, and he instantly recoiled before realizing that what was underneath his feet was simply stone, but it was almost like it was alive, radiating body heat. He put one foot after the other, and found himself descending down a staircase into the dark.

He didn’t know how long he was descending, until the stairs rapidly stopped. He was standing on flat ground, the floor warm like the stairs had been, and was completely surrounded by darkness, save for a small light on the opposite side of what appeared to be a room.

He took a single step into the room and instantly found himself surrounded in an explosion of light. A small orb of light, much like the ones in the jars of the store, circled his head, leaving a halo of pure white around his head. Other orbs began to join it, and soon, a cacophony of light surrounded Abbott, as if welcoming him to the lair of his master.

One by one, the orbs glided to specific points on the wall, lighting up the room in a mess of colors. It should have been obnoxious, chaotic even, but there was something about the way the soft lights blended together that Abbott found oddly comforting, even in the midst of the apparent robbery. A final emerald light hovered against the wall of the chamber, shivering, beckoning him to move forward, to come and see what it had in store. Abbott’s feet moved as if in a dream, he walked forward, entranced, to a much larger and messier workbench against the opposite wall. This was where Alastair truly made his potions; ingredients were spread everywhere with measuring and mixing tools scattered in for good measure. The orb seemed to be pointing him in the direction of the middle of the workbench, however, and Abbott moved in for a closer look. Surrounded by frog legs and newt eyeballs was a single sheet of paper. Abbott’s hand reached out and picked it up on its own accord, his skin paler than usual bathed in the peaceful glow; it was as if his body did not belong to him anymore. The hand drew the paper closer to his face, and his eyes took in the paper as his heart stopped.

The sheet was covered in various sketches of small figures in excruciating pain- one was being crushed by a boulder, another being turned inside out, and yet one more was being drawn and quartered. Not an inch of the paper was left blank; various forms of torture were everywhere he looked, each more gruesome than the next. While this was terrifying in its own sense, this wasn’t what disturbed him the most.

Written at the top of the paper was a single word: a name.

ABBOTT.